


Legacy

by TurtleTotem



Series: Augustos [1]
Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Jokaste's baby, M/M, Post-Kings Rising
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-18
Updated: 2016-09-18
Packaged: 2018-08-15 15:51:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8062477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TurtleTotem/pseuds/TurtleTotem
Summary: Damen still has a little family left, after all. And he does need an heir. But Laurent is not easily convinced.





	

They found the child in a border village, cared for by a kind but overwhelmed nursemaid who was relieved to have someone take responsibility for her charge.

“You want to make sure he’s well cared for,” Laurent said, the sentence almost a question, his body held tense and uncertain as he watched Damen lift the baby from his cradle.

“Of course.” Damen settled the baby in his arms, and gave him his fingertip to hold; it looked enormous and very dark in the tiny, lighter hand. He knew he was smiling foolishly; how could anyone do differently? The baby was too darling, curly-haired and dark-eyed, sleepy and trusting in his arms.

“He’s Kastor’s son.” The words were blunt and colorless, utterly without inflection. Still Laurent was watching him, as if there were no telling what he might do.

“I’m not sure Jokaste can know for sure,” Damen said. “There could not have been much time between us. But very well, assume he is. He is still my last living family. And I his, but for his mother, who has vanished who knows where.”

“It would be a very hard thing,” Laurent said, “to be Kastor’s son, in the current political climate.”

“Yes. One of the many reasons not to call him such. He can be my son as easily as my nephew; he will be, in every important sense.”

Laurent shifted, less wary now and more displeased, as if Damen had just confirmed his worst fears. “You mean to raise him at Ios.”

“At Marlas, if the current debate over capitals goes the way I think it will.”

“You mean to make him your heir.”

“Yes.” Damen looked Laurent in the eye, hopefully giving no sign that he’d had to steel himself to do it. “Whether he is my child or my brother’s, he is my father’s grandson, blood of my blood.”

“You would put the son of Kastor and Jokaste on the throne.”

“Has he betrayed me?” Damen lifted the baby in Laurent’s direction. “Look at him. What a dangerous beast. He might turn on me any moment.” The baby gurgled, alarmed by the change in position, and Damen hurriedly pulled him back again, bouncing him against his chest with a shushing noise.

Laurent shook his head. “You astonish me. You—at all times, you astonish me. I think there must be some defect in you, that your heart has not the boundaries of other men’s.”

“It’s a defect that’s done me harm more than once,” Damen admitted.

“And today it leads you to propose an Akielon bastard’s bastard for the throne of Vere.”

Damen looked at him sharply. “Vere?”

“Was I not clear on that point? I will have no heir of my own body; yours must do for both of us.”

Damen stared at him for a moment. He had to admit, he had not made the connection—though he supposed it followed logically, from Laurent’s stated intention to end his family line, and the deep, multilayered alliance between their nations. It might indeed be fairly called a _union_ of their nations.

For a moment, he could not speak, his breath stolen by the implications, and by the casual assurance with which Laurent made them.

“Any heir of mine will be a bastard in any case,” he said after a moment. “As I can’t imagine you agreeing to share me with a wife.”

Laurent stiffened, as if somehow this had not occurred to him. “Certainly not,” he said, chin high, eyes blazing, and it was all Damen could do not to kiss him.

“Well, then. An Akielon bastard it is, whether this one or another—what difference is it to you?”

Laurent lapsed into a thoughtful silence for several moments, and looked down at the child for the first time, now dozing against Damen’s chest. “An Akielon bastard on the throne of Vere,” he murmured, this time sounding, not horrified, but almost gleeful. He extended a finger, cautiously, to brush against the baby’s sand-colored cheek. A child of the fair-skinned, snake-minded Jokaste, Damen thought, was the closest they would get to a combination of his bloodline and Laurent’s.

“Has he a name?” Laurent said.

Damen looked toward the nursemaid, almost out of earshot across the room.

“Oh,” she said, surprised to realize she was being addressed. “I-I’ve been calling him Theomedes, Exalted.”

A name Damen would have been happy to keep, but Laurent’s sharp glance was enough to tell him that that would be a step too far, as a name for a future king of Vere.

“Perhaps,” Damen said slowly, “something more of a compromise. Perhaps the Akielon form of a name that is also popular in Vere. Such as Augustos.”

He heard Laurent’s quick intake of breath, and did not dare meet his eyes for a moment, giving him time to react—then felt Laurent’s hand on his arm. He looked up to find Laurent gazing at him with such a glow of shy, quiet happiness that he was entirely lost in it for—who knew how long? Long enough for the baby to begin to kick and squirm in his arms, making tiny fretful cries like a kitten.

“He’s hungry, Exalted, if you don’t mind my taking him for a moment,” the nursemaid said timidly.

“Of course.” Reluctantly, Damen handed the baby over, and the nursemaid took him into the next room.

The moment they were alone, Damen filled the empty place in his arms with Laurent instead, who was off-kilter enough to allow it.

“We’ll call him Gus,” Damen said, and Laurent jabbed him hard in the ribs.

“We certainly will not! What is he, a goatherd?”

“Augustos is almost as much a mouthful as Damianos! He must have a nickname.”

“I won’t stand for any such nonsense.”

“Stand for it, sit for it, lie down, it all works for me.” Damen tightened his arms around Laurent’s middle and lifted him, high and effortless, savoring Laurent’s undignified squawk of surprise.

“You cannot win the argument through reason, so you resort to brute force?” Laurent kicked and pushed at his shoulders, grunting with effort. If he’d been willing to hurt Damen, of course, he could have been free in an eyeblink.

“Force? No. But there’s more than one way to persuade a man.” Damen took two steps to the wall and pinned Laurent against it, feet still far above the ground.

“Barbarian,” Laurent muttered, breathless and pink-cheeked. His legs had instinctively risen to wrap around Damen’s waist.

 _“Your_ barbarian.”

“My barbarian.” Laurent pulled him forward by the hair and kissed him.

 

 

“I’m not calling our son Gus,” he said, much later that night, a breathy mumble against Damen’s lips. Baby and nursemaid were installed somewhere below, with better quarters forthcoming; Damen was determined the child be kept close by.

“You called him our son,” Damen whispered, nearly giddy. “That’s good enough for me.”


End file.
